New Testament Kephalaia

These kephalaia are provided for users in the Nestle-Aland Novum Testamentum Graece. My edition is the 27th. A few numbers which were lacking in the NA27 were kindly provided me via email by Edgar Krentz, who checked in his NA24 (these were in 1 and 2 Peter).

The kephalaia are not, as some would hold, original divisions of the text. There are earlier traditions preserved in various manuscripts, where the kephalaia appear in a later hand. Their origin is unknown. They probably date from some time in the fourth century.

They appear to represent a separation of the material into subject sections. As you may note in the tables below, some sections are very long (sections 9, 10 and 16 in John), and others very short (section 12 in John: a single verse!). Though there are some variations in the manuscripts concerning where the sections begin, the below listing appears to represent the majority, judging by the inclusion of the headings in NA27 (where the very few variants are included in parentheses).